A Florida appeals court on October 7 ordered a sealed Leon County grand jury report on the Hope Florida controversy expunged in full, and Governor Ron DeSantis immediately turned his fire on whoever leaked it, demanding accountability for the disclosure.
The grand jury inquiry, initiated by State Attorney Jack Campbell's office, examined Hope Florida, the state initiative championed by First Lady Casey DeSantis, and its charitable arm, the Hope Florida Foundation. The report concluded the DeSantis administration had "misappropriated" $10 million in Medicaid settlement money as part of what it called a sophisticated scheme to finance political activity.
The money came from a roughly $67 million 2024 settlement with Centene Corp., a Medicaid contractor accused of overbilling Florida's Healthy Kids prescription-drug program. The agreement sent $57 million to the state and $10 million to the Hope Florida Foundation. The grand jury recommended no criminal charges, finding no witness willing to take responsibility for the original allocation decision. DeSantis, former Attorney General Ashley Moody — now a U.S. senator — and current Attorney General James Uthmeier were never called to testify.
The report traced the funds step by step: the Foundation awarded two $5 million grants to nonprofits called Secure Florida's Future and Save Our Society From Drugs; those organizations passed a combined $8.5 million to Keep Florida Clean, a political committee then chaired by DeSantis's chief of staff, Uthmeier. From there, $7 million went to the Republican Party of Florida and $1.23 million to another political committee, bankrolling opposition to 2024 ballot measures on recreational marijuana (Amendment 3) and abortion rights.
One nonprofit applied for its $5 million at Uthmeier's "direct instruction," the report said, and Moody knew of the diversion plan, authorizing her chief deputy John Guard to sign the settlement despite his reservations.
A three-judge panel of the 1st District Court of Appeal issued a 19-page opinion ordering the report destroyed. Judge Lance Neff, appointed by DeSantis in March 2026, wrote that a grand jury "may not declare conduct unlawful and then decline to charge it, and it may not condemn people by name without indicting them." The court called the report "inconsistent" and "error-ridden," and held that the $10 million was "never public money," making the transfer a lawful executive action the Legislature had not made illegal.
The ruling has caveats. The appeal was one-sided — no one appeared to defend the report — and the opinion does not reconcile the fact that the state itself had treated the $10 million as public money when reimbursing the federal government. The decision is not final until any motion for rehearing is resolved.
DeSantis had already staked out his position on August 27, 2026, the day after CBS News Miami first published the sealed report. At a Lake City press conference, he said the only apparent crime in the affair was the unauthorized disclosure of a confidential report — the leak itself — while maintaining the settlement was legal, advanced Florida's interests, and involved no wrongdoing by his wife. He has consistently called the controversy a hoax.
After the October 7 ruling, DeSantis posted on social media that the decision was the "judicial equivalent of a death-by-firing squad to the Hope Florida Hoax." Uthmeier's office stated that "grand jury proceedings are confidential" and that "unauthorized disclosure of those proceedings is a crime."
Expungement has not ended the matter. Uthmeier, whom DeSantis elevated from chief of staff to attorney general in February 2025, is on the November 3 ballot facing Democrat Jose Javier Rodriguez. Senate Democrats demanded the resignations of Uthmeier and Moody after the report surfaced. State Representative Fentrice Driskell has called for an IRS investigation, saying, "We refuse to lift our foot off the gas when it comes to Hope Florida and the abuses of our taxpayer dollars."
Florida taxpayers have paid more than $300,000 to law firms in the grand jury matter, and how the sealed report reached CBS News Miami in the first place remains unexplained.